Bodleian Migration Project

This section of the Nexus pages contains information regarding the migration of the Bodleian Exchange system to Oxford Nexus.

These pages are intended to highlight some basic Nexus functionality, illustrate any changed features and assist with any common client issues that may result from migration.

The following pages explain the reasons for any changes and indicate if you have any further options for consideration. If you disagree with something that the migration team have sent, please review your options as outlined on these pages and then email nexusmigration@it.ox.ac.uk.

Please note that the migration team may be dealing with a large number of requests, and your email will be placed in a queue. It will receive a response, but this may not be immediate.

The migration is scheduled to begin on Friday 20th September 2013. Please be aware of several things to expect regarding:

Calendar entries being duplicated in some circumstances.

Forwarding or mailbox rules in your Bodleian mailbox.

Setting up some delegations and sharing again after the migration.

Setting up your signature again.

Re-enable 'autocomplete' contacts.

Junk E-mail settings.

Out of office (OOF) messages.

For further information please see Known issues: User noticeable changes below.

1. FAQs or most commonly asked questions

Will we lose any functionality with the move to Nexus?

You should be gaining functionality as you are moving from a very old system (Microsoft Exchange 2003) to a new system (based on Exchange 2010). But there are some changes. Some of these are captured in the FAQs at:

Can we access our email from outside the University through Google by typing 'Bodleian webmail'?

Searching 'Bodleian webmail' will not be the best route post-migration. You can either:

Search for 'oxford nexus' or

Remember nexus.ox.ac.uk (and that will take you to Outlook Web App, webmail).

If there are problems after the migration who do we contact?

Your IT support arrangements have not changed, generally. However, for migration-related problems in the days following your migration, you should email us at nexusmigration@it.ox.ac.uk.

Does the size of one's mailbox have any bearing on migration?

The size of your mailbox doesn't have any direct effect on the migration process other than time: a larger mailbox takes a little longer.

Is there a maximum size that we should conform to?

The Nexus service does impose as standard a quota for mailboxes of 2GB. For those people who have gone just beyond this, there is a discretionary increase that can be applied up to 3GB. Your mailbox will be migrated with whichever of those sizes is appropriate for its current size. If your mailbox is larger than 3GB you should consider removing or archiving content. Alternatively, there is a chargeable service for mailboxes above this size. The migration project will pay for any such costs that you incur up to July 2014. The cost is currently £1.50 per GB per month and will be payable from August 2014.

What preparation should I do in advance of the migration?

Because smaller mailboxes are faster to migrate we will be asking Bodleian staff to remove any content they no longer need. This might include, for example, older items from your 'sent items' folder, you may be able to delete un-needed subfolders, and empty your junk email folder. As a final step, emptying the contents of your 'Deleted Items' folder will then clear this content and make your mailbox easier to move. Reducing the amount of data we have to move around makes the migration process faster and reduces support issues. We know that there will be people for whom every last item in their mailbox is essential: for them, nothing is superfluous. We're working on the worst-case basis that everyone will want every last thing migrated. If you are able to remove some old content from your mailbox this will be a great help to us but is by no means essential.

What if something in my mailbox can't be copied?

In some very rare cases it is occasionally possible that one or more items in a mailbox can't be copied. This is known as a 'corrupt item' and is relatively rare. If this should happen we would expect to notify you of the item's details and attempt to recover that data.

What will happen to the library's BlackBerry Enterprise Server users?

After the migration you'll need to reconfigure your BlackBerry to use the Nexus BlackBerry server. You will need a short-lived one-time password. The process is very straightforward but you need to contact the Help Desk or the Migration Team for instructions.

As part of the migration process it will be necessary to reset the device. This MAY clear data from your device so please ensure that the device is backed up beforehand (so this may be anything on the device which is NOT within your mailbox).

Once the device has been reset you need to simply perform an Enterprise Activation as described here.

What are the default privacy settings for my calendar's appointments and events?

By default the calendar settings that will be applied will only permit other users to see your availability. This is referred to as 'free/busy information' and is the same setting that was used on the Bodleian library's Exchange system. This setting means that other users will not, by default, be able to see the specifics of any appointment or meeting. The intention is that others can see the gaps in your calendar between your meetings and appointments. They are given no further information. Should you wish to share more detail with a particular colleague it is possible to grant specific individuals additional rights to view the full detail of your calendar items. However even when you have chosen to do this it is still possible to mark certain items as 'private' if you wish to restrict them from viewing the detail.

Will I still be able to access shared mailboxes along with my own personal e-mail, through Outlook, after migration?

When we migrate your current personal mailbox we will also be migrating all of the shared mailboxes that are in current use. You will still be able to access these from within Outlook or Outlook Web App (webmail) after migration. We intend that most shared mailboxes will appear automatically within Outlook after the migration, unless you request otherwise. However, please make sure that the migration team knows which mailboxes you need to access for your needs as some delegation information is not migrated.

Is there any arrangement to accommodate the needs of people using separate Bodleian and Nexus mailboxes for two different functions?

Yes we are making arrangements for people in your position. We expect that, post migration, you will have two Nexus mailboxes with one for each function. Should you prefer, however, we can combine the two separate mailboxes into a single one on Nexus. However, you must inform the migration team otherwise the two mailboxes will be merged.

Will we be migrating the mailboxes of people who no longer work here?

There are quite a few accounts of this type that have already been flagged as not to be migrated. There are clues (e.g. where they have already been set so that no external email is ever delivered to them) which have helped us to determine moribund mailboxes. If you, or your team, have a need for continued access to such a mailbox, you must contact the migration team. The team may need permission from your head of department in order to accede to such a request, especially where such access was not previously in place.

What about retired people who occasionally use Bodleian Exchange: will their data be migrated?

Those who have retired come generally into two categories: 1) People who have gone through the official channels and have retired status on a new University Card. These people usually have an @retired address and we can simply transfer their old email into their (Nexus) @retired mailbox. Some of these people may not want this, however and the migration team should be contacted to find some other solution to keep these emails separate. 2) People who have an ad hoc arrangement with the old system and who still have access to their old mailbox. This is a difficult situation for a migration. People who have left the University will typically have no account with Registration (and thus no Nexus account) or will have an account that is about to be deleted. If anyone you know falls into this category, probably the best way forward is for them to get proper 'retired' status and thus to be able to have an account in Nexus. This can be actioned by departmental administrators.

What about people who have data in the Bodleian Exchange but now work for another part of the collegiate University: will their old data be migrated?

There are a few cases of this. For example, if someone used to work for a library but now works for a college or department, s/he may have left behind a mailbox on the Bodleian Exchange some time ago, and doesn't expect to need that old data. Some of these cases are easily judged by the migration team and data will not be migrated. Others may need to be contacted at their new address to ask what they want to be done with the contents of their old mailbox.

After the migration, will all of the data in the Bodleian Exchange be deleted?

This is an important question for those who have been flagged as not to be migrated. The data within the Bodleian Exchange will be kept for several months prior to deletion. Therefore if IT Services is contacted within a reasonable length of time, it is very likely that the data will still exist and it could be either migrated at that time, or copied to a CD or DVD for safe keeping.

What happens if I fill up my mailbox quota in Nexus?

In Oxford Nexus Exchange you will be allocated a 2GB standard quota. In some cases this may be set to 3GB. You must not exceed this space allocation. If you exceed it your e-mail may cease to function until you have done some housekeeping. If you go considerably beyond your quota emails will fail to be delivered to your mailbox.

Does Oxford Nexus enforce any kind of data retention policy e.g. archiving or deleting e-mail after a specified period of time (e.g. 90 days)?

Regarding retention: unfortunately not (this needs to be set up 'locally' either by a mailbox rule or some kind of appliance) as Nexus wasn't designed for this. Some generic mailboxes can be used for this purpose, e.g. people in a small team can have their incoming and outgoing emails copied into an 'archive' mailbox. N.B. This may not be legally compliant in situations that come under specific legislation as - usually - members of that small team are still able to go into that shared mailbox and choose to delete something.

Regarding the automated deletion of email, Oxford Nexus has a 'managed folders' policy for Deleted Items and Junk E-Mail: items are automatically removed from the folder 90 days after they were put there (N.B. how long they've been there, not how old they are).

If you have access to a previously departed person's email, you should let the migration team know. It is not planned to migrate old users' data and if you still need to access it, another solution must be found.

What do I need to do to my mobile device?

There are many different types of mobile device. Whether a tablet, iPad, iPhone or Android, if possible, we recommend using an ActiveSync setup.

When I send a mail to an address I used before migration it fails, why?

When you first send an email using Outlook it will remember the address. The next time you begin to type that address Outlook will prompt you to autocomplete this address again. It is possible that after migration this could fail in which case you will need to remove this remembered or cached entry and re-select from the University address list.

Please email nexusmigration@it.ox.ac.uk. Please note that the migration team may be dealing with a large number of requests, and your email will be placed in a queue. It will receive a response, but this may not be immediate.

2. Public Folders

From 1st July, 2013 all data that currently resides in Public folders will be moved to new more suitable locations. Please see section 2.5 for details.

Public Folder location

If you are unfamiliar with what is a Public Folder, it may be that you do not use them. You may possibly have one or two mapped as 'Favourites'.

However, to see Public Folders, run Outlook and select 'Folder List' view.

Figure 1. Folder List View (Ctrl+6)

Select 'All Public Folders'.

Figure 2. Public Folder Location

Expand for a full list.

Figure 3. Public Folder List

Why are we changing the use of Public Folders?

Bodleian Exchange Public Folders have to be changed in preparation for the migration to the more modern Oxford Nexus Exchange Service.

What are the alternatives for data that was once in a Public Folder?

Your Public Folder or the data (usually email and calendars) it contains could be moved to one of the following.

Please email nexusmigration@it.ox.ac.uk. Please note that the migration team may be dealing with a large number of requests, and your email will be placed in a queue. It will receive a response, but this may not be immediate.

3. Maillists, Distribution Lists and Distribution Groups

If you are used to sending an email to a list of recipients, these lists will be migrated to Nexus and you will be able to continue to use them as you did before.

The migration process will ensure the names and membership continue as they were using the Maillist Service.

Note - If you are simply trying to use your old list, the old email addresses will still work. The notes which follow are primarily for list owners if they need to change memberships or how the lists operate.

If you are the nominated owner of a list you will be responsible for any subsequent changes in membership or configuration using the Maillist service from your browser.

Maillist: Electronic Mailing List Service

This is an IT Services managed service, separate to Nexus.

The electronic mailing list service ('Maillist') provides support for sending email messages to multiple recipients, and is often the ideal solution where requirements go beyond the group/list capabilities offered by many email clients.

A list can potentially receive mail from anyone and is highly configurable.

You may find that the migration team has recommended one of the following configurations. If you are the owner you will be able to change the behaviour and membership of the list.

Type 1 can be mailed by anyone.

Type 2 can be mailed by members only but sends all-to-all. Typically a discussion list.

Type 3 can be mailed only by nominated users. It typically has many recipients. An ‘announcement type’ list is a good example.

As part of the migration process any lists required will be defined and initially configured for you although most commonly this will be a Type 2 list.

Any changes in membership or configuration post migration can be done simply via a browser by the nominated owner or manager(s).

Once the membership of a group has been established by the person who has Distribution Group Manager rights (or the owner), the group can be used to allow access to a calendar, mailbox subfolder or entire mailbox, as follows.

Once granted membership (by the Distribution Group manager) this can allow access to a calendar, mailbox subfolder or entire mailbox.

To contact the migration team

Please email nexusmigration@it.ox.ac.uk. Please note that the migration team may be dealing with a large number of requests, and your email will be placed in a queue. It will receive a response, but this may not be immediate.

4. Outlook Web App

4.1. Email access using Outlook Web App

The Nexus email service can be accessed from a browser using the following link. https://nexus.ox.ac.uk Note that this is an https page.

If you are away from your desk or your email client does not seem to be working you can access your mailbox from any browser.

To access your Oxford Nexus email account you need to sign in using your single sign on username and password.

Alternatively you can browse to the IT Services homepage and select 'Email Login' at the top of the page (you could even google “oxford nexus login”).

There are options to log in from a public computer or a shared computer. Please select as appropriate for your own security.

Once authenticated you will be presented with your personal mailbox.

Note. The vast majority of browsers will present this interface. On some less well known browsers you may be presented with the 'light' interface, please check with the Help Centre for details.

Note also that if you prefer a simpler interface you can either set “Use the blind and low vision experience” in the Options, General section or select the “light” version using the tick box at login.

4.2. Using Outlook Web App to access another mailbox

After logging into your own mailbox as described previously, you can also connect to any other mailbox that you have full access to (provided it is NOT hidden from the University address list). To do this:

Click on your name in the top right hand corner.

Type some search characters of the display name of the required mailbox and click open.

You may receive a message that more than one match was found.

Select the required mailbox and click open.

4.3. To contact the migration team

Please email nexusmigration@it.ox.ac.uk. Please note that the migration team may be dealing with a large number of requests, and your email will be placed in a queue. It will receive a response, but this may not be immediate.

5. Migration checklist

In order to prepare, there are some tasks you can perform now, some you should do before migration and some after migration.

If you have any pst files in your Outlook profile note their display names and location.

Please ensure that you check your Q:\ drive for information regarding the location of any data.

5.2. Tasks you should perform BEFORE migration

Who else currently has access to (some folders in) your Exchange mailbox?

If that was ‘Full Access’ for the entire mailbox, this will automatically be preserved. Otherwise, you will need to set these up again after the migration so it is important to record the permissions currently set.

Permissions set individually (by you, usually via Outlook, in the past) on folders will be lost. If you have, therefore, shared a folder with some colleagues, that will need to be set up again, in your Outlook client, after the migration.

These could be Generic mailboxes, other colleagues’ mailboxes or even mailboxes of departed colleagues. If you access other colleagues' folders, including their calendars, they will need to set up the 'sharing' of these with you after the migration.

Make a note of these and contact those colleagues after the migration.

Do you already use a Nexus mailbox?

It is important to contact the migration team to avoid mixing up the two mailboxes on migration (unless you want this to happen).

Please email nexusmigration@it.ox.ac.uk. Please note that the migration team may be dealing with a large number of requests, and your email will be placed in a queue. It will receive a response, but this may not be immediate.

6. Outlook Configuration

The way Outlook has been setup for you is called your Outlook profile. As well as accessing your mailbox there may be other settings that you rely on that you will need when migrated to the Oxford Nexus system.

In case you need to re-apply any settings they are detailed in these pages.

It is important to understand if your data is currently in a pst, what that pst file is called and most importantly where that pst file is located.

A pst file can typically contain a similar folder structure to your main mailbox. Items can be moved to a pst file using the Outlook Archive, AutoArchive processes or they can be moved manually.

Important: A pst file may contain many items (within that single file), this single file and the data it contains does not reside on your current or future mail server. A pst file will reside either on the local hard disk of your computer OR on a network drive your computer connects to.

When viewing your Outlook folders you see your own mailbox, any other mailboxes added to your Outlook profile and data (pst) archives. In this example ‘IT Services – Dummy Room’ and ‘Student Admissions’ are other mailboxes and ‘Outlook Data File’ is a pst.

Note that ‘Name’ is the display name within Outlook, ‘Filename’ is the filename including the full path.

Note also that name and filename MAY NOT be the same (so it may display in Outlook as ‘Archive 2010’ but the filename could actually be ‘archive.pst’).

Email data currently within your mailbox will be moved to the Nexus system. Any pst files you currently use need to be opened within your Outlook profile so you can continue to access this data.

Important.As the data in any pst file is NOT part of the email system,it is your responsibility to ensure that it is backed up (so if it currently resides on your local hard drive, how would this data be retrieved if this disk failed?). It may be that this file resides on a network drive. Please check with your IT Support Staff if you require further clarification.

A pst file can simply be moved like any other file if it requires moving.

Summary

Please check your current setup. If you have any pst files in your Outlook profile note their display names and location.

After migration, if you cannot see any of these archives, simply open Outlook, select File, Open and browse to the required pst file.

Note: The migration to Oxford Nexus will not do anything to these files.

6.2. Message Processing Rules

You may have rules that take action when you receive or send a mail (e.g. move a mail received from someone to a particular folder). These can be exported to a file:

Within Outlook go to Tools, Rules and Alerts then Options.

Select 'Export' and save your rules to a file.

After migration simply re-run the process and import the rules from your saved file.

Note - It is possible that the import process can fail so it is important to have a manual record of your most important rules.

6.3. Outlook Remembered or Cached Addresses

When you create a new mail and you type the first letters of a previously used email address, Outlook prompts you for the rest.

Note that this is a remembered or cached address, NOT a contact.

If you have any addresses you require you will need to add them to your contacts folder.

Once the address as been added to the To field, right click and select 'Add to Outlook Contacts'.

If, after migration, sending to this address fails (and you have NOT made it a contact) you may need to delete this remembered entry by simply pressing the delete key once the address is selected and BEFORE it is entered in the To field.

6.4. Outlook Signature

Your signature at the bottom of an email message is typically stored as a file on your local disk drive but can be re-created from your sent items.

Within Outlook go to Tools, Options, Mail format and then Signatures.

You can then save the contents.

Alternatively you can save the files for later.

On Windows XP the signature files are found C:\Documents and Settings\%username%\Application

On Windows 7 the signature files are found C:\Users\%username%\AppData\Roaming\Microsoft\Signatures

To see this folder you must have 'View hidden files and folders' enabled or you can simply copy and paste the above paths in the address bar in Explorer to directly open the folder.

Note that your one signature will generally consist of three files and a subdirectory.

To contact the migration team

Please email nexusmigration@it.ox.ac.uk. Please note that the migration team may be dealing with a large number of requests, and your email will be placed in a queue. It will receive a response, but this may not be immediate.

7. Known issues: User noticeable changes

Items may be duplicated (i.e. 2 or more copies) in people's calendars under the following circumstances:

If existing calendar entries are updated after the migration.

If meeting requests – sent prior to migration – are accepted after the migration.

The meeting organiser is duplicated in the attendees list. (We have raised these with the vendors or our migration tool but they don't seem to be making progress with a resolution to these problems).

Whereas any delegation permissions on whole mailboxes (e.g. Full Access delegated to another individual) will be preserved, permissions set individually on folders or calendars will be lost. If you have, therefore, shared a folder or your calendar with some colleagues, that will need to be set up again, in your Outlook client, after the migration.

A few people may have had forwarding set in Nexus to 'keep a local copy' and may therefore see duplicate emails. This should be fairly unusual and can be remedied by deleting the duplicates. Also, anyone with significant content in Nexus should have been contacted by the migration team.

Some users will see email from a previous role which they have long since forgotten about.

Information/data that will not be migrated includes:

Mailbox rules (where people have created rules to move messages into particular folders, mark as read, move to Deleted Items etc. etc.)

Signatures.

Remembered email addresses in webmail (N.B. saved contacts will be migrated). Outlook remembered email addresses may be preserved depending on how the Outlook profiles are updated.

Junk Email filtering settings (all users will be set to 'medium' in Nexus).

Out of Office/Facility (OOF) settings, whether on or off and the messages may not be migrated in some cases.

Forwarding to another system other than Nexus.

Any mail drafted and 'sent' with Outlook in an offline state during the outage may be lost depending on how the profile reconfiguration is handled.

8. Generic mailboxes: how people should access them

What you should know as an owner of generic mailbox:

To be able to access the entire mailbox you require Full Access permissions – these are given by Nexus and should be requested via IT Support.

If you (the owner) need to grant specific access to others to part of this mailbox (e.g. read only access to the calendar), you must set the delegation permissions yourself.

Usually, if you are assigned Full Access permissions, the generic mailbox maps itself in to your Outlook client automatically. If you do not want this to happen, request the removal of the 'automap setting' from IT Support.

If staff need to be able to send e-mail from the generic e-mail address, rather than their personal mailbox, they should have Send As permissions. These also should be requested via IT Support.

If only part of a mailbox has been shared with you, then you need to find and open this manually.

Please email nexusmigration@it.ox.ac.uk. Please note that the migration team may be dealing with a large number of requests, and your email will be placed in a queue. It will receive a response, but this may not be immediate.